The recent Pew findings—that churchgoers, especially white evangelical Protestants, are more likely to believe that torture can be justified—have caused many commentators to wonder whether particular forms of Christian theology engender an acceptance of the use of torture.
In a recent article on Religion Dispatches, Sarah Sentilles suggests that Christian theologies and images of Christ’s crucifixion (essentially is an act of torture) have influenced some Christian communities’ understanding of torture as salvific, necessary, and justified. This view of torture is especially fueled by what is known as atonement theology: the view that Jesus’ death provided reparation for humanity’s sins against God.
So what would a Christian theological response against torture look like?
Most Christian theologies are rooted in the writings of Paul, who is particularly celebrated this year by the Catholic church on the bimillenial anniversary of the apostle’s birth; Paul provides the earliest interpretation of the meaning of the crucified Christ. People often forget, or are not aware, that nowhere in the gospels does Jesus himself explain the meaning of his own suffering on the cross. But Paul does.
And I believe that if we were to bring Paul into our current dialogue about whether Christians should support the use of torture, his response would be a resolute “No!”
First, Paul’s life experiences reflect a radical shift from violence to nonviolence due to his Christian conversion. The Acts of the Apostles describes Paul before his conversion as persecuting the earliest followers of Christ. At the outset of a religiously-sanctioned campaign to persecute Christians in Damascus, Paul encounters the risen Christ on the road to Damascus and undergoes a dramatic, religious conversion; from persecutor to preacher. Paul’s encounter with Christ, then, transformed his life of religious violence to a life of love.
When we shift our attention to Paul’s writings, we see further indications of his stance on nonviolence. Take, for instance, his statements in Romans (12.14, 16, 17–21), which echo the themes of nonviolence and non-retaliation in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount:
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them… Live in harmony with one another… Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Not to Crucify but to be Crucified
Scholars have typically paid little attention to the themes of nonviolence in Paul’s letters, and some would argue that Paul does not hold such a position. In recent times, however, a small voice in biblical studies has drawn attention to Paul’s theme of nonviolence as it relates to his understanding of God’s restorative justice. New Testament scholar Richard Hays asserts in The Moral Vision of the New Testament: Community, Cross, New Creation, “There is not a syllable in the Pauline letters that can be cited in support of Christians employing violence.” He further explains that even in cases where Paul employs military imagery in his rhetoric, they “actually have the opposite effect: the warfare imagery is drafted into the service of the gospel, rather than the reverse.” We observe Paul, then, as actually re-visioning violence in light of the gospel.
We see in the life and teachings of Paul a inculcation of a Christian lifestyle of justice and nonviolence through the cross; one that imitates the crucified Christ who did not inflict suffering on others, but who embraced it for the sake of others. Michael Gorman, in his book Reading Paul, argues that the saving, restorative justice of God “takes place not by inflicting violence on the enemy, but by absorbing violence on behalf of the enemy. Its extreme modus operandi is not to crucify but to be crucified. It does not require the destruction of the enemy but the embrace of the enemy.”
I believe that Christians must embrace and embody Paul’s revision of violence. This also needs to be applied to our understanding of America’s rhetoric and activities of justified war and violence, and the “war on terror.” We must be mindful that Christians are to embody the cruciform ethics of not crucifying (i.e. torturing) one’s enemy, but to be crucified (i.e. be tortured) on behalf of one’s enemy. And our attention needs to be not only on those who are tortured, but perhaps even more so on those who torture.
Rhetoric such as a “war on terror” that seeks to eliminate terrorism and condones the use of violence and torture (i.e. terror) is contrary to Paul’s view of God’s peaceable, restorative justice.
As Gorman argues in his newest book, Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul’s Narrative Soteriology:
That world leaders who call themselves practicing Christians (or Muslims or Jews) seem to espouse such views and that many others who follow such leaders seem prepared to carry out their allegedly sacred violence without question should concern us deeply. More specifically, as an alternative to this kind of thinking and acting, the church of Jesus Christ must make nonviolence a more central dimension of its life and teaching and a central corollary of its creedal affirmation that God raised the crucified Jesus from the dead, thereby ending the case for violence as the modus operandi of God and of God’s people in the world.Those who are in Christ today, with Paul, identify with the life-giving and reconciling cross of Christ, validated by God in the resurrection, not as an expression of a violent personality or a conviction that violence can be sacred and salutary, but in the paradoxical belief that in Christ and his cross God was nonviolently reconciling the world to himself and giving to us the ongoing task of nonviolent reconciliation of people to God and to one another. In that spirit, we may need to be prepared to absorb violence, but not to inflict it. Such is one central aspect of the calling of our time to those justified, sanctified, and divinized in Christ.
In sum, Paul’s stance on nonviolent reconciliation and justice provides us with the necessary anti-torture posture for Christians today as they reflect on and respond to the pressing issues of war, terrorism, and torture.
Will Christians embrace Paul’s moral vision and lifestyle of justice and nonviolence?
Tags: apostles, atonement theology, catholic, christian, evangelical, nonviolence, pacifism, peace, salvific, sin, st. paul, theology, torture, v. henry t. nguyen
You claim "that nowhere in the gospels does Jesus himself explain the meaning of his own suffering on the cross."
Come again?
In Matt 20:28 and Mark 10:45 Jesus says that he came to give his life as a ransom for many.
Further, Jesus claimed to be the Messiah prophesied throughout the Scriptures (e.g. Lk 24:25-26, Matt 26:63-64). In the synagogue of his home town, Jesus identified himself with a Messianic figure in Isaiah (Lk 4:16-30); following this his own townspeople tried to throw him over a cliff for being presumptive. Elsewhere in Isaiah is a passage, understood by Christians as Messianic and prophetic of the cross, that gives us the meaning of Christ's suffering in the most haunting and beautiful language; Isaiah 53, known as the Suffering Servant passage.
Jesus seemingly was quite succinct, and his disciples dull of understanding, still he is unmistakably represented in the gospels as having stated the meaning, both directly and indirectly (through identifying himself as the Davidic Messiah), of his suffering and death.
Excerpt from Isa 53:
Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
And our sorrows He carried;
Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten of God, and afflicted.
But He was pierced through for our transgressions,
He was crushed for our iniquities;
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
And by His scourging we are healed.
All of us like sheep have gone astray,
Each of us has turned to his own way;
But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all
To fall on Him.
Tom S.
Thanks for bringing up this point. I should clarify. First, the published statement you quote is not what I originally submitted for publication. Perhaps the editors misunderstood what I was saying or meant to say as they edited the piece. I meant to say that Jesus in the gospels does not provide any explicit explanation for the significance of his torturous death on the cross. But even this wording can be ambiguous.
There are many loaded scholarly issues (e.g. historiography, historical Jesus) involved in understanding how Jesus understood his mission and pre-mature death. ( NB: I do not consider myself a specialist in the study of the historical Jesus.) One particular issue is whether the words coming out of Jesus' mouth in the Gospels are authentic or are they reflecting later Christian interpretation.
Paul's letters, which predate the Gospels by 20 years or so, are our earliest evidence of the early Christian movment, and they provide the earliest reflections on Jesus' death and resurrection. My point in the article is to point out Paul's important role in explicating the theological significance and meaning of Jesus (e.g. Jesus dying for sins and Jesus being the Christos).
I would agree that in the gospels Jesus does refer to his death – and possibly did understand it to have an atoning value. I should point out that Mark 10.45 (cf. Matthew 20.28) is debated over whether Jesus' words “to give his life as a ransom for many” is an interpretative gloss. Moreover a number of scholars hold that Jesus did not see himself as the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 and that his passion predictions are derived from Daniel 7.
Again, there are too many tough issues to deal with here. My point in the article is to accentuate the significance of Paul's writings for articulating the meaning of Jesus' violent death.
In short, I agree that "nowhere" is probably not accurate, although the few passages in the gospels that appear to offer some interpretation are quite elusive.
A Christian can be right to support measures that are calculated to save innocent lives. And there is no call to portray Evangelicals as cavemen for supporting these as short-term measures. It was the case shortly after 9/11 that our leaders greatly feared massive loss of lives in America and did what they thought they must do to try and avoid that scale of tragedy.
If I as a Christian (assumed completely innocent of offense at the time) am attacked physically by someone, I have the right to react passively and turn my other cheek. But if I as a Christian see a weak innocent person being attacked and, being capable myself, refuse to risk my own well-being to rescue or protect the victim from further harm, am I really following Paul, or would that be following the devil (the coward and liar)? Do I decide that another person needs to turn their cheek and suffer harm because my particular values system says so? Refusal to fight for others welfare is not my idea of being Christian or a good admirer of the Apostle Paul.
The strong, results-oriented interrogation methods everyone seems to be debating over seem nothing more to me than a case of government (which the NT says is established by God for our good) bearing the sword against evildoers of an extreme and especially dangerous kind. Did they stretch our laws beyond a breaking point? They say no, and I am inclined to accept their word for it.
Tom,
You raise ethical questions that reveal the difficulties faced in this cultural debate. I do not believe that the answers to this pressing issue are that easy.
I only offer here some further points of reflection, especially concerning sacred violence:
The government, according to Paul, does bear the sword against evildoers (Romans 13.4); but Christians do not.
In the New Testament there are no examples of Christians (even Roman soldiers who converted to the Christian faith) employing violence in God's service.
I do think we should look for the good of the other person, which is a constant challenge. But do we see violence as a normative option? In fact, we have statements offering alternative postures: e.g. "proclaim the gospel of peace"; "love your enemies"; "live peaceably with all", "do not repay anyone evil for evil."
Jesus and Paul endured for the sake others the violence of the "empire" — even for those considered enemies of God.
Although the "turn the other cheek" maxim can seem like a radical, unrealistic ideal, it should be placed with a larger framework of eschatological hope in God's ultimate vindication and his reconciliation of the world to himself. This hope is what provides the rationale and possibility for such radical acts of nonviolence. Without this hope, these ethical deeds would not be make sense.
Interestingly, the NT does seem to be indifferent to Christians being in roles requiring the exercise of force, soldiers in particular. But the NT certainly does not endorse it or portray any use of violence by such individuals. Perhaps the point is that such cases should be seen as an anomaly to a more normative understanding of an eschatological community of Christians who are to embody an ethic of nonviolence and nonretaliation within the hope in God's ultimate reconciliation.
Concerning your proposed scenario, Paul and Jesus demonstrated a life of enduring the suffering for others, NOT being a coward and refusing to risk their well-being. Does "fighting" for others' well-being necessarily mean the use of violence? And regardless of how one might actually respond to the scenario, the new symbolic world that the New Testament describes through the cross clearly favors nonviolence rather than violence.
Overall, the New Testament does offer rules and principles concerning violence/noniolence, and they are often difficult and challenging to discern their practical implications for Christians today.
[For more, I recommend the studies by R. Hays, M. Gorman, J. Yoder, and S. Hauerwas]
That the real reason Christians support torture is because they have sold out to a political version of power? In my mind, that is more likely to be the cause of pronouncements that their god is pro-war, and all that goes with it.
I also believe that the further reason for all the conflicts based on different interpretations is due to the fact that they are believing a man-made religion. A fiction. It makes all the theological speculations a waste of time. And we will have to live with this religious contradiction as long as we ascribe any divine significance to monotheistic religion.
dbum, I, a 'white, evangelical protestant' do not 'support' (am not enthusiastic about) harsh interrogation techniques, but in the limited circumstances after 9-11, I tolerate them for the greater good of the chance or strong potential to save the lives of many real innocents. Having the responsibility for providing for safety for a large population is probably something no one can really understand unless they've been there. Those who acted in that capacity should not now be thanked with the harrassment of politically motivated investigations followed by prosecutions, especially since their motivation appears to have been only the saving of their countrymens' lives.
If your wife and children were being threatened with rape and murder by violent people and an associate of these bad actors, believed to have knowledge of your loved ones' whereabouts could be physically coerced into revealing their whereabouts, and the way to their Achilles heal, I suspect you might make a quick exception to your vaunted ethics.
Basing morals on hypotheticals and straw arguments don't cut it Tom. You "tolerate?" Care to support any of your argument with Scripture, and then tell me of your god of mercy?
You further demonstrate to me the religious conservative (not at all right in this issue) sell-out. A little political power, your thirty pieces of silver, for your own conscience, a little "what if" argument.
And torture has never been proved to work, despite what Cheney claims. Rather the opposite. So maybe you'll post some facts next time instead of "what if" arguments designed to generate guilt and fear. Then you'll see that torture was used, and failed, to try to justify invading the wrong country, and had nothing to do with protecting America.
And rape of my wife, always a threat in this world, hardly constitutes an act of violence like 9.11. What you just did, unconsciously so, was justify using torture in local criminal investigations.
How can you not see the weakness in your argument, even from a simply logical point of view, let alone provide a scriptural basis to support your white evangelical protestant point of view?
No wonder the number of those claiming no religious affiliations at all is growing.
Comments closed
The comments for this story have been closed. Thank you to everyone who participated.